


sweet disposition

by jaylocked



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Asexuality, F/M, Not Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Compliant, because fuck the cursed child tbh, that's all it is but yay for that, this is a coming of age asexuality story - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-03
Updated: 2016-12-03
Packaged: 2018-09-06 05:34:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8736790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaylocked/pseuds/jaylocked
Summary: Sometimes, growing up isn't all it's cracked up to be, and the pieces don't seem to click together...until they do.a story about asexuality, growing up, and the people who get us there





	

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on HPFF under the username RavenclawFTW, resposted here to get all my fic in one place. Title from song by The Temper Trap of the same name.

Rose dreamt of her first kiss ever since she learned what kissing meant. 

It was supposed be with a charming boy who had swept her off her feet, and the kiss would be wonderful. Her foot would pop up, like they did in the movies sometimes. The setting would be suitably romantic: maybe by a lake in front of sunset, or a moonlit garden, or even in a quiet corridor they had all to themselves.

But then the years passed, and all her friends had _their_ first kisses, and Rose started to wonder if maybe she should lower her standards. After all, her parents had first kissed right in front of Uncle Harry, and they seemed perfectly happy.

And then her moment arrived.

The setting was nothing too exciting, and it felt like quite an average place for a First Kiss. Ravenclaw beat Hufflepuff in their first game of the season, surprising nobody. The ‘Claws wasted no time in setting up the celebratory party in the Nest, complete with a few bottles of smuggled alcohol, moderately loud music in one corner, and ‘Claws taking the opportunity to unwind from their intense schedules of revision, revision, and more revision.

The circular room allowed noise to bounce around, the sound of laughter and conversation overwhelming Rose’s senses. She could see that somebody had Conjured some cloth to cover the bookshelves– typical ‘Claws, more concerned over their books than having a good time.

Rose had come with some of her friends, Charlotte and Al and Dennis, because they liked a good party, even if it _was_ completely unrelated to Slytherin. As fourth years, they were finally allowed into the parties, and not even James or Fred could stop them. Luckily, the two seemed absent from this party, though Fred was probably snogging some poor girl in a broom cupboard already.

Rose had been excited for the party, not only because she finally had the opportunity to wear her new skirt, but because she thought tonight might be _the_ night. The night she and Logan finally moved beyond their awkward flirting and stolen glances and mutual blushing into something new and exciting and _more_.

Rose had never had a boyfriend before, and she was basing most of her knowledge on Charlotte’s month-long relationship with Raj from the year before, when she’d come back to the dorm flushed and excited and bursting to share what they had done and what he had said and how _exciting_ everything suddenly was-- or at least, how exciting it was before they got bored after one Hogsmeade date, countless snog sessions, and three walks around the lake.

This year, Charlotte had already gone on a date with Aleksi, not to mention the brief fling she had with Kenny. Rose had watched, confused and slightly jealous, as Charlotte seemed to mature and grow up faster than Rose ever could. But then she and Logan had been paired together in Herbology, and although not the most romantic of classes, something had sparked.

She felt all the classic signs that Charlotte told her to watch for when she was around Logan: her heart beat faster, and her palms felt sweaty, and she simultaneously wanted Logan to pay attention to nothing but her and for him to not see her at all so she could avoid the inevitable embarrassment that she would soon feel. And that queasy feeling in her stomach-- that had to be the butterflies that Charlotte and all those authors had mentioned. Right?

When they first arrived at the party, Rose, Charlotte, and Dennis hung around the drinks table, awkwardly debating whether or not they wanted this to be the milestone First Drink while Al abandoned them to “comfort” his girlfriend Isabelle after the game-- from the enthusiastic tonsil tennis they seemed to be playing, Rose suspected that she would be just fine. 

Rose and her friends decided against alcohol-- it wasn’t even a Slytherin party, after all-- and settled for standing in a corner and yelling over the numerous, overwhelming conversations. Rose exchanged a glare across the room with Malfoy, who was sat playing Exploding Snap loudly with some of his Housemates.

She stood beside Charlotte and Dennis, who were deep in a discussion about Goblins, if Rose had heard correctly. She straightened her green top nervously, hoping it really _did_ bring out the colour of her eyes like her mum said it would, and smoothed her hair back. Charlotte had convinced her to leave it down for once, and the added pressure against her back was unnerving. There was a reason she normally liked to braid it.

“Hey Rose,” a new voice sounded behind her, causing her to jump and spin around in surprise. She came face-to-face with the blue eyes that had been the subject of so many of her thoughts and daydreams over the past few weeks. “What d’you think of the party?”

“Not bad,” Rose replied, trying to look cool and unbothered and aloof, just like Charlotte had told her to do. She let herself scan him quickly, taking in his blue polo shirt and dark jeans. Was he trying to play up his eyes as well? Or perhaps they both just had a streak of House pride going on.

“What’s a Slytherin doing at a Ravenclaw celebration?” Logan questioned, smirking slightly and leaning into Rose. Rose was suddenly very aware of how little space was left between them, ostensibly because of the numerous students stumbling and dancing all around, but Rose hoped she was allowed to read more into it. She could just smell his breathtaking cologne.

“Maybe I was hoping to bump into somebody.”

Rose’s coy response felt awkward coming out, like she was pretending to be somebody or something that she wasn’t. She looked up at Logan, trying to look through her lashes like Charlotte had instructed her, and was pleased to see him actually smiling, not just smirking.

“Well, we have to make sure you find them, then! Who were you looking for?” Logan’s mouth was upturned into a joking grin, and Rose forced herself to look at his lips and think of kissing him. Charlotte told her that doing that made the guy think she wanted to kiss him, so he would be more confident.

 _That...looks like a mouth_ , Rose thought, perplexed at the obsession others had at describing lips. _Luscious_ and _full_ and _kissable_ , she thought, trying to figure out what they meant, whether she could assign them to the mouth in front of her.

“You might know him,” Rose said after a moment, trying to pass her confusion off as flirtation. “He has blonde hair, blue eyes, a mischievous streak...reasonably handsome?” Rose held her breath, terrified at her forwardness. _What if he didn’t like her back?_

“Hmm, just reasonably handsome?” Logan repeated with an even wider grin. “I’m afraid I’m not familiar with anybody of that description here...maybe you should try Hufflepuff?”

“Oh, I guess I better go find and comfort my mystery man, then,” Rose responded with a slight smirk and was gratified to see Logan’s eyes-- _dreamy? glinting? dilated?_ Rose wasn’t sure, they just looked blue to her--fixed on her lips.

“Actually, you know, maybe you could help me find somebody I’m looking for.” Logan’s mouth quirked back into a smirk and he leaned even closer to Rose. “This redhead, very witty, a bit headstrong, whom I would like to kiss very much?” 

His confident tone trailed off towards the end and Rose thought he seemed nervous, but she wasn’t a great judge of these things. And anyway, her heart was thudding erratically in her chest and her palm sweat could probably fill the Black Lake _and that was disgusting why was she thinking about palm sweat while Logan was standing this close._

“I think I might be acquainted with her,” Rose breathed back. She purposefully flicked her gaze down to Logan’s mouth again. “And I think the feeling is mutual.”

Logan closed the distance, and his lips were on hers, and Rose waited for the fireworks--

 _His lips are touching my lips,_ Rose thought idly. _They’re rather wet, aren’t they? Oh Merlin, where’s his tongue trying to go-- it’s in my mouth. Why is his tongue in my mouth? People enjoy this sort of contact? What am I supposed to do with_ my _tongue?_

A minute later--and Rose was very aware that it was an entire minute, as her thoughts bounced noisily around her head--he broke away, panting slightly, but looking quite pleased with himself. Rose smiled, unsure of the protocol after two people mutually place their tongues in each other’s mouths. Did he want to do it again?

“Would you like to go to Hogsmeade with me?” Logan asked quickly, his expression hopeful and nervous and so endearing. For him, Rose decided, she could put up with that disturbing sensation of _tongue on tongue_ and squishiness and-- Rose didn’t need to think further about it.

“Of course.” And Rose smiled up at him again, hopefully through her eyelashes.

That was when Rose first started wondering if something was wrong with her. But then again, maybe there would be fireworks the next time.

* * *

Hogsmeade had been wonderful, and Rose loved spending time with Logan and getting to know him better, and holding hands with him made her ears warm but she thought she could identify the feeling that settled into her chest as _happiness._ Logan had initiated two more snogs, and Rose had been just as confused at the end of them as she had been at the party. There were no fireworks, no butterflies; just a vaguely moist sensation in the region of her tongue.

But Logan seemed quite pleased with the whole thing, so Rose let him take the lead, and really it wasn’t _so_ bad, just confusing. It seemed worth it to go along with everything and hopefully at some point soon it would just _click_ and she would want to kiss him like he wanted to kiss her. For now, Rose would wait and see.

“Your cousin asked me about my intentions with you,” Logan told her when she joined him at breakfast one Saturday morning. She and Lucy had been fighting about him, because Lucy insisted that she had a huge crush on Logan and Rose was trying to annoy her by stealing her man, despite Lucy never having told Rose about it. Lucy had finally admitted to Rose that she was wrong, so after a hug and a quick chat, Rose was free to flaunt her relationship in peace.

“Which cousin?” Rose asked, scowling slightly. They’d only been--going out? hanging out? snogging? labels were all so _confusing_ \--for a few weeks. There was no need for the Spanish Inquisition so early.

“James,” Logan informed her, sliding his hand into hers, which just felt so _right_ that it made everything worth it. His robes looked slightly rumpled that morning, like he had picked them off the floor without a thought before heading down to breakfast, although his hair was fairly tame.

“I’m so sorry,” Rose groaned, setting her head down on his shoulder. “I should’ve known he’d do something like that-- he’s always running around doing these odd things-- my family is crazy, you know.” Logan just laughed.

“He told me that he approved, but he’d let Fred do whatever he wanted if I hurt or used you.” Logan was smiling as he said that, like he didn’t mind at all that James had the potential to unleash a boy who had exploded both the Ravenclaw and Slytherin Common Rooms on him.

“And you’re not running the other direction?” Rose laughed nervously as she began plotting her revenge against James and his idiot ways. _When would that boy_ learn--

“I mean, I already know about them,” Logan shrugged, still oddly unconcerned as he awkwardly buttered some toast one-handed. “You can’t go to school with James and Fred and _not_ know about them. And that would be a rubbish reason to stop seeing you, wouldn’t it?”

And when he said things like that, well, Rose didn’t care that he liked snogging her quite a bit, because he was just so _caring_ and _compassionate_ and _sweet_ but also _funny_ and _smart_.

Rose decided she quite liked having a boyfriend.

* * *

Others weren’t as sold on the whole affair. James was set after he questioned Logan’s intentions--and apparently their conversation had taken place under a table, which confused Rose endlessly--but her other cousins found new and novel ways to test the worthiness of her new beau.

Fred set several small pranks to go off around Logan, apparently to test his reactions in a crisis. Lily and Hugo were happy enough when Rose suggested they could all eat dinner together one night. Logan attended it with charm and grace, and Rose felt that glow in her chest once more. Dominique also cornered Logan to question him with Louis in tow, who apologised profusely to Logan for the whole ordeal.

Besides her enormous family, however, there was still a period of adjustment: Dennis and Albus were happy enough to share her with Logan and Logan’s mates as long as they could make jokes about it, but Charlotte seemed thoroughly confused every time Rose left them to hang out with Logan and not just snog him.

(And on the Snogging Front, nothing made any more sense to Rose than the first three times it had happened. There was just the unhygienic exchange of saliva and a rather gross feeling in her mouth because _somebody else’s tongue was in there._ )

One of the biggest adjustments for Rose was the time that she now spent in Scorpius Malfoy’s company.

Malfoy, as Logan’s fellow fifth year Ravenclaw, was often around when Rose sat at the ‘Claw table at meals, or hung around in the ‘Claw Common Room, or just generally went anywhere with Logan.

This was a problem.

“I don’t understand why you don’t get along with the guy,” Logan repeated idly one Saturday afternoon as they snuggled by the fire in the Ravenclaw Common Room. Rose had come to appreciate the calm and comfort of the ‘Claw Common Room. It was different from her own House in the dungeons, but the ‘Claws usually understood the value of quiet. “He’s really quite nice once you get to know him, not to mention smart. You two could get along quite well, I reckon.”

“Logan, you just don’t get it,” Rose responded with a small groan. Logan was quite wonderful and understanding in so many ways, but for some reason he couldn’t understand her grudge against Malfoy. “First of all, my father preconditioned me to hate him from the moment I lay eyes on the boy, and Weasley grudges stick around. Then, of course, we’ve been at each other’s throats since our first conversation. A Weasley and a Malfoy could never get along. It’s in our blood or something.”

“Aren’t James and Scorpius friends?” Logan questioned with a small smile. This was not a new discussion, nor did Rose find it a fruitful one. Logan was a touch too logical and rational to understand the hot anger that flowed through Rose’s veins when she heard a particular cold drawl.

“Maybe, but James is a weirdo,” Rose shrugged. Who understood the motives of James Sirius Potter? Certainly not Rose. “Logan, we’ve talked about Malfoy enough times, haven’t we? We just don’t bring out the best in each other. I doubt anything could change that.”

Logan sighed and rested his head against Rose’s, his breath fanning across her cheek and tickling her slightly. He was staring deeply into the fire like he could find the answers to this riddle in its depths.

“Okay, Rosie. But maybe you could try to avoid starting arguments with him? It’s only that he’s my mate and he’s around a fair amount, so if we could maybe keep the peace, that’d be better?”

Rose exhaled a long breath and nodded. Logan didn’t ask for much, and she really did like him quite a bit, so it made sense to acquiesce to this small request. Not _starting_ arguments would be fine-- Malfoy was sure to initiate them on his own, anyway.

Logan and Rose sat by the fire for a few more hours, discussing anything and everything. Rose had given up trying to look at him through her lashes, but she wasn’t so sure that advice had mattered that much anyway. They disentangled themselves just before curfew, sharing one chaste kiss before parting ways. _That_ she thought she understood.

Just after she exited the Common Room, Rose bumped into somebody hard enough to send them both sprawling to the ground.

“Sorry--” she and the mystery person started saying at the same time. She looked up to find the hard grey eyes of Scorpius Malfoy. Their apologies died in their throats.

“Too stuck in gaga romance land to watch where you’re going, Weasley?” Malfoy bit out as they both stood, dusting off their robes. Rose grimaced, remembering Logan’s words, but he had started it, dammit!

“Jealous that nobody would look at you twice, let alone go out on a date with you, Malfoy?”

Rose’s words exited her mouth without conscious thought. Insults and arguments with Malfoy came second nature to her. She thought she caught a small frown on Malfoy’s face before his trademark sneer replaced it.

“You know, I actually really like Logan. He’s a good guy. I can’t really figure out what he sees in you, though. Maybe I should talk some sense into him...”

Rose rolled her eyes mockingly, ignoring the voice deep within her that was saying, _“Logan is too good for you, Rose. You know that.”_ How did Malfoy manage to make her second guess every little thing about herself?

“You know, I actually really like Logan. He’s a great guy, and a fantastic boyfriend. I’m not so sure I agree with his taste in friends, though.” Rose’s pulse was pounding in her ears, mixed with the icy cold clarity that arguing with Malfoy always brought. 

She sometimes felt like she could see all his faults and concerns and insecurities when they brought these arguments on themselves, that she knew him better even than she knew Charlotte or Al. The thought of a reciprocal understanding made her nervous. It just felt like _something_ flowed between the two in a way that Rose didn’t feel anywhere but in front of those piercing silver eyes.

“I’ve been thinking about it, and I’m sure your uncle’s shop would sell love potions. In fact, you could probably get one for free...” Malfoy tapped his chin with a finger as he smiled coldly at her.

“SHUT UP!” Rose yelled. Damn, he had gotten her to lose her composure first. “That is such hippogriff dung!” Rose took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I think you’re letting your jealousy overrule your common sense. Not that you had much to begin with.”

Malfoy was smirking widely, as he always did when she started the yelling rather than the other way ‘round. Logan’s words from before flashed through her mind, and she suddenly felt guilty for sticking around for this pointless argument after Logan had _specifically_ mentioned that she should try to avoid it. Just as she was going to turn and leave, Malfoy spoke again.

“I always thought that snakes were cold-blooded, but you’ve never been the typical snake, have you? No, you’re more Gryffindor than you like to admit: rushing into situations before you think it through, letting your emotions get the better of you. That’s not very Slytherin, is it?”

All thoughts of leaving the argument left her mind as Rose turned back to Malfoy. _How did he know these things about her?_

“And you’re more Slytherin than you’d like to admit, aren’t you?” Rose all but hissed, walking close enough to Malfoy to poke him in the chest and see the ice in his hard grey eyes. “I’d certainly describe you as cunning, wouldn’t you? But there’s no problem being in Slytherin, not anymore. That is, unless you’re avoiding being compared to your father...”

“But I’m not the only one avoiding that comparison, am I?”

The silence that followed was thick with tension as neither broke their heated gaze, neither backed down. Rose could hear herself breathing hard from the anger that flowed through her body, warming her and fueling her hatred. Down the hall, something loud clanged-- some of the armor, maybe, or Peeves fooling around. Whatever it was, it broke her concentration and allowed her to step back with a jerk of her head.

“Stay away from me, Malfoy,” Rose gritted out, stalking away from him with her head held high. She was making a strategic retreat, especially given what she and her boyfriend had discussed just several hours ago. She wasn’t afraid of Malfoy, no. _Afraid_ wasn’t the word.

By the time she had climbed into her bed that night, she had calmed down sufficiently to ignore Malfoy and his cutting (but annoyingly accurate) remarks. No, she ignored his comments, and instead focussed on how her hand felt in Logan’s, how her chest had glowed as they discussed his family and seeing each other over break. With that memory in her head, she fell asleep. And if a pair of grey eyes popped up in her dreams, well...nobody needed to know.

* * *

She and Logan lasted ten months. Ten months of wonderful conversations, contented handholding, shared secrets, comforting snuggling, and, for Rose at least, terribly confusing snogging. They shared their First Drinks at a party just after winter hols, where they learned that Rose became very emotional when drunk, and Logan started making numerous dirty jokes that turned Rose’s entire face scarlet. They later shared First Hangovers after a terrible Gryffindor Quidditch party, lamenting over a late lunch the fact that they had to move at all.

After six months, they had a fruitful conversation where they questioned what love meant, as they could understand it from novels and television and their peers. At the end of the discussion, they decided that yes, they could understand what it meant to love somebody, and yes, they did love each other.

Logan accepted it when she really just needed to head to the library for a while, because everything was building up too much and she needed to focus. And then sometimes she even let him come with her because he wasn’t too much of a distraction, and watching him bite his lip while he bent over an essay didn’t make her feel much of anything really, just a slightly fond glow deep in her chest.

Rose wanted to know everything about Logan-- what made him excited, how he saw the world, what he thought about when he was alone. She wanted to understand the complexities of his brain and look out at the world from his eyes. She wanted to spend every moment with him, and every moment they were separated was a waste of time.

But then one day, he took her hand as they walked to the library as they discussed feminism and Hogwarts, and whether she may want to start a club to discuss it further (he said that he would attend every meeting, which made her feel that glow in her chest she associated with _happiness_ ), and suddenly his hand felt awkward in her grasp. _Had it always been so big and clunky, overwhelming hers so completely?_

She fell out of love as she had fallen into it: analyzing, questioning, debating. She wanted to talk to him for hours and hours about consent and female empowerment and maternity leave (for she really was her mother’s daughter), but she didn’t need to spend every moment of the day with him. She wanted to sit in the library and write essays with him, but holding hands while doing so isn’t very practical, is it?

“Logan, I’ve been thinking,” Rose started hesitantly. Rose had stopped going to Charlotte for advice once she realized that she and Logan had been dating longer than Charlotte had ever experienced, but that left her on her own to figure it out. Logan had been the one leading the way throughout the relationship--not because Rose subscribed to the idea of the man needing to be the one to initiate things, of course, but just because of the dynamics of their relationship. But she knew what she had to do now.

“Do you ever do anything else?” Logan inquired with a smile, swinging their arms happily as they approached a beech tree by the edge of the lake.

“Well, no,” Rose agreed with a chuckle. She came to a stop beneath the tree, dropping his hand and leaning against the tree trunk. She took a deep breath and looked up at him, steeling herself for this conversation. “It’s just that lately...it’s rather felt like we’re just very good friends who kind of force ourselves to kiss each other, you know?”

Logan frowned thoughtfully and looked out across the lake. Rose could see him roll his shoulders back once, like he always did when he was thinking hard about something. He turned abruptly to face Rose with a bright grin. “It really does feel like that, doesn’t it?”

“Yes,” Rose agreed in relief. “I mean...I still love you. I just don’t think I’m really in love with you anymore.” 

“What do you think the distinction between those states are?” Logan inquired. He was smiling slightly-- not mad, just curious. Rose had become an expert on the many moods and expressions of Logan Crawford.

“It’s hard to explain,” Rose frowned. She had thought so hard about this, but the chance to vocalize her thoughts brought her up short. “I guess...three months ago, it was hard for me not to think of you all the time--even when we weren’t together, I wanted to tell you immediately about something I had just thought of, or something I had seen that reminded me of you. But now...I’m happy when I see you, and I love spending time with you, don’t get me wrong. It just feels less...urgent. It’s more like how I think of Dennis or Charlotte.”

 _The bizarre sensation of snogging you isn’t worth it anymore,_ she thought, wishing she’d had the courage before to bring up her total lack of understanding over the whole issue. But it wouldn’t do very well to bring that up when they were breaking up.

Rose continued to stare out at the lake, aware of Logan doing the same beside her. In the distance, she could see the mountains outlined against the hazy sky. 

“Yeah, I can understand that,” Logan agreed after a moment. “Three months ago, I wouldn’t have let you stand here this long without grabbing your hand again. But it doesn’t feel as necessary anymore, if that makes any sense.”

“D’you think that’s just what it’s like when you get used to being in love?” Rose asked, looking back into Logan’s cerulean eyes. She had found some of her own words to describe Logan’s eyes since that first night, a mental file devoted to the shades and swirls around his pupils. Logan’s mouth quirked down into a frown, his forehead crinkling with concern.

Rose still couldn’t any find any appropriate descriptors for Logan’s mouth. It just was.

“No,” Logan decided. They had both been caught up in their own thoughts for a while, contemplating their surroundings, their relationship, each other. “No, I think we got used to being in love before we fell out of it. There was a time when we were okay to be apart, not like right after we figured everything out, and that was when we got used to being in love. These past few months we’ve just been constant for the sake of it.”

“We had a good run of it,” Rose offered after several more minutes of contemplative silence. Logan nodded with another grin.

“That we most certainly did,” Logan agreed. He flung his arm around her shoulder, like he did all his other mates, and his arm across her shoulder felt infinitely lighter than his hand in hers moments before. They walked slowly back towards the castle, silent but for the crunch of leaves and grass beneath their feet. “It’s been a pleasure to fall in and out of love with you, Ms. Rose Weasley.”

“Likewise, Mr. Logan Crawford.”

They separated with a hug when it came time for Rose to go to the Slytherin table and Logan to the Ravenclaws. They smiled sadly as they parted, but no words were spoken. They didn’t need to promise that they’d remain friends; it was a given.

Somehow, Rose was mostly relieved that they wouldn’t have to snog anymore.

* * *

A week after their break up, Rose was happy. She and Logan had managed to maintain their friendship, having gone and worked together at the library with no awkwardness. It felt a little strange not to rush to him with good news or to freak out at him over every tiny thing, but not in a bad way. She was just...adjusting.

An entirely too recognizable and unwelcome voice cut into her consciousness as she searched her Charms textbook for help on her essay. She was sat off to the side in the library, where it was quiet enough to focus, but not so quiet that she could hear her breath or the creak of the chair too loudly.

She took comfort in the uncaring aisles and silence of the library. The books, with their words and ideas and unchanging spines, would remain there long after Rose left the hallowed halls of Hogwarts, and took no notice of the petty drama surrounding them. And when Rose breathed deeply, inhaling the scent of aged parchment and dust and knowledge, it felt like nothing had really changed.

“So, Weasley, I hear your boyfriend’s gone and dumped you.”

Rose looked up to find Malfoy standing over her desk, a book in hand and a sneer in place. An automatic scowl overtook her features.

“Not that it’s any business of yours, Malfoy, it was a mutual decision.” Rose’s tone was haughty as she corrected him. Malfoy snorted and his--pink? soft? dammit, Rose still didn’t know how to describe mouths--lips pulled up into a mocking smile.

“You know, Weasley, that’s exactly what you say when you’re dumped.”

Rose ran a hand along the top of her head, tracing her braid to calm herself down. Trust Malfoy to twist an amicable and friendly breakup around and throw it back in her face.

“Because you have so much experience in the matter, Malfoy?” she questioned sweetly, trying to push her anger down and _not let him get to her._ Malfoy shrugged casually, like it didn’t bother him, but Rose thought something else flashed across his face before it hardened into his trademark sneer.

Rose didn’t want to admit that she was slowly becoming an expert on the many moods and expressions of Scorpius Malfoy.

“Personally, I don’t really see how it took him ten months to realise that you’re an insufferable know-it-all, but Logan does try to see the best in people, doesn’t he?” Malfoy continued, ignoring Rose’s comments.

“Oh good, let’s resort to calling names, shall we?” Rose questioned sarcastically, rolling her eyes. “Look, Malfoy, I understand that you’re a lonely little git who doesn’t have many friends or anything, but some of us actually have things to do and people to see. So let’s cut this lovely discussion short, mmkay?”

Rose turned back to her essay and ignored Malfoy as best she could. It seemed for a moment like he was going to push the matter, but eventually he sauntered off, leaving Rose to her essay, but her concentration was shot. Ten minutes later, Rose stormed out of the library, cursing bloody Malfoy to the high heavens.

* * *

Three months later, Rose was still wondering if something was wrong with her.

It wasn’t a constant thing, like it was when she was regularly confronted with Logan’s mouth. It was more of an idle curiosity when she attended parties and saw her peers attacking each other with their mouth, glued themselves together as they danced along with the music. It was something she wondered about when Albus and his girlfriend decided the breakfast table was a good location to snog passionately.

Sometimes, she wanted to talk about it with somebody, but didn’t really understand what that would mean, or even what it was that she wanted to talk about. It was just a curiosity that circled around her mind as she lay in bed at night and tried to sleep, tried to untangle her thoughts.

“What d’you mean, you don’t miss having a regular snog partner?” Charlotte asked, rolling over and staring incredulously at Rose. She flipped her hair over her shoulder expertly, her actions not out of place in a shampoo advert, putting Rose’s own messy bun to shame. But Rose had learned long ago that comparing herself to Charlotte would bring nothing but trouble

They were having a back to school girls’ night to discuss the holidays and get mentally ready to return to school. Rose was lying on the crumpled green duvet of Charlotte’s bed, her pyjamas already in place. Charlotte took care to wear nothing but thoughtfully elegant night clothes, like the nightgown she donned that evening, but Rose was more than comfortable in her shorts and loose Chudley Cannons shirt.

“Was Logan a bad snog?”

“I don’t want to talk about Logan like that with you,” Rose said firmly. She focussed on the careful application of her blue nail varnish rather than the disbelieving gaze of her best friend. “It makes me uncomfortable, and I’m sure Logan wouldn’t appreciate me going around and discussing his kissing technique.”

Rose could feel her neck heating up from the topic at hand. She agreed with everything she had said to Charlotte, yes, but it was also a deflection. She didn’t know how to bring the question up; she barely knew what the topic was, but there was something in her that was different than Charlotte, who went from boy to boy quite easily and happily, never investing too much, always happy with the outcome. Charlotte, who lamented her winter holiday at home in her small town, where there weren’t sufficient boys to eye up or snog come New Years. 

“You know what the problem with you and Logan was--” Charlotte began.

“There wasn’t a problem with me and Logan,” Rose cut off. This was an old, tired conversation, one that Charlotte was eager bring up and rehash indefinitely, and one which Rose was over the day after she and Logan had broken up. “We just fell out of love. It happens.”

“No, listen to me, Rose!” Charlotte insisted. Rose sighed, finishing her left hand and leaving it out to dry. Charlotte had painted her nails quickly and efficiently, giving her more time to think of ways to torture Rose. “I thought of it over break. You two were too similar. I mean, you must have realised that he’s basically the male version of you in some ways, right? You’re probably the two most mature students in the year, even if you don’t always act it. You need somebody who’s different than you; you need somebody who you have tension and passion with. You and Logan were so tame. You were like an old married couple after a week of dating.”

Rose started to retort and call Charlotte on talking about bullshit when she paused and actually thought about her words.

 _What if that’s what I’m missing out on?_ Rose wondered, staring up at the green hangings above her and blowing on her nails. _What if it’s not about me, it’s about who I’m kissing?_

“Aha! You’re actually thinking about it! I’m onto something!” Charlotte crowed excitedly.

“That hypothesis may have something to it,” Rose conceded.

“You need somebody different than you,” Charlotte repeated. Her eyebrows drew together in a look of deep concentration as she contemplated the problem at hand. “I know! Malfoy!”

Rose blinked. That was about the time that Rose stopped taking Charlotte seriously. 

“You think I should get together with _Scorpius Malfoy_?” Rose repeated incredulously.

“Maybe just snog a bit,” Charlotte shrugged. “It could be good for you. You need to loosen up a bit, you know.”

Rose snorted and started on the second coat of nail varnish. Contrary to Charlotte’s statement, she had felt a million times lighter since her breakup and the constant confusion her relationship engendered within her, even if there had been a lot of happiness to make up for it.

Shaking her head, Rose listened as Charlotte started discussing her potential next snog partner, narrowing down the number of candidates. But later, as she lay awake in bed, Rose couldn’t help but wonder if Charlotte’s theory had any merit.

* * *

A week later, Rose and Malfoy were put on patrol together, and Rose couldn’t get Charlotte’s words out of her head as they met up on the second floor.

The empty stone corridor looked cold and unforgiving in the weak moonlight. It would be eerie if Rose hadn’t adjusted to the castle at night and its many shadows early in her tenure as prefect. Now, she enjoyed watching the shadows change with the phases of the moon, as she learned more about her home in the past six months than she had in the four years before that.

That day, however, Rose was less focused on the shadows and more on the pale Ravenclaw beside her. Today, his hair was carefully combed and tidy, and his robes looked fairly unwrinkled even after a long of lessons. They fell into step easily, the vacant castle echoing their footfalls back to them as they walked along without conversation– or, as so frequently happened with the two, without any arguments.

Passion. It wasn’t a word that she had ever associated with her and Logan, that was for sure. She couldn’t really ever attach that word to herself, but Charlotte thought that she and Malfoy had it. Is that what she was supposed to call the ice cold dread she felt when forced to interact with him, or the uncontrollable anger only he managed to spark in her?

“Merlin, Weasley, you look like you’re going to hurt yourself, thinking that hard.” Malfoy’s snide remark broke her concentration and she looked at him with a slight scowl. She opened her mouth to retort, stopped, took a deep breath, and averted her eyes from his steely gazy.

Rose wasn’t entirely comfortable to find a file in her mind that had assembled words relating to Malfoy’s eyes, _stormy_ and _intense_ and _cutting_ and _cold_ \--

At least Rose found no words relating to his mouth in her mental filing cabinet.

“D’you ever get tired of fighting?” Rose asked quietly as they rounded a corner. She could feel his surprised gaze land on her face, but she stared determinedly ahead as they continued down the corridor.

“Never thought I’d hear you say that,” Scorpius finally responded, avoiding the question at hand. Rose shot him an annoyed glance to find, for once in his life, a thoughtful expression upon Malfoy’s pale features.

They had completed a sweep of the floor before Scorpius broke the silence again.

“Yes.”

The solitary word hung between them: daring Rose to mock it, exposing Scorpius for one brief moment. It was so quiet it could have been in her imagination, except for the sigh that Scorpius heaved in accompaniment.

“What if we tried...not fighting, for once?”

Rose’s words were hesitant. These were untread waters, even more ambiguous and nerve wracking than her breakup with Logan. There was tension there, just under the surface at all times, because Malfoy had the ability to look through Rose, to understand her concerns and fears and point them out better than almost anybody else she knew.

“I don’t know what we’d even talk about if we weren’t at each other’s throats,” Malfoy finally commented. Rose looked back towards him, and her brown gaze was locked into the grey of his eyes, free of storms and ice for once. They looked curious and bright, and his mouth was turned up into a small smile: a peace offering.

“What’s your favorite lesson?” Rose asked after another long stretch of silence, unbroken but for their footfalls and breathing. Malfoy shot Rose an amused grin, catching her off guard and giving her several new descriptors to add to the _Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy_ file in her mind, which was rapidly thickening against her wishes.

“That’s such a Ravenclaw conversation starter,” Scorpius chuckled. Rose frowned, but before she could take umbrage, he continued, “Not in a bad way. Merlin, Rose, I’m not out to always insult you. And how could comparing you to my own House be an insult?” He bit his lip with a frustrated groan. “Let’s just give each other benefit of the doubt, okay?”

Rose nodded, but her mind was focused on the sound of her name on his tongue, and how right it felt. Rose. Scorpius. She shook her head, turning back to him as he prepared to answer her question.

“Well, I’ve always been a fan of Charms. It feels the most useful, you know? Not to mention how much I like Professor Ventra. She understands the importance of useful homework, and doesn’t take distraction kindly.”

Rose hummed, considering Malf-- _Scorpius?_ a voice in her head wondered, but Rose wasn’t sure what this conversation really meant for them--cautiously. While he had talked, his eyes had lit up enthusiastically, and his hands had flown around in front of him, meaningless gestures that seemed important to him. Rose had never seen this side of him before, and she couldn’t help but think he seemed so different, so approachable.

“What about you?”

His words cut through her thoughts, causing her to drop her gaze as her ears began to warm. She hadn’t meant to stare at him. Shaking herself out of it, her reply came easily to her-- after all, she could debate the merits of various classes half-asleep.

“To be honest, I’ve always hated Charms. Felt too surface level, not enough theory. I much prefer Transfiguration-- it’s much more of a challenge, and the power it affords is greater.”

 _“You like Transfig theory?”_ Disbelief colored every part of Malfoy’s question, but there was still a small glint in his eyes, and a distinct lack of ice.

Rose wasn’t sure who said what after that, or who won that particular argument. She did know that she had enjoyed it, especially after it had ended with civil “goodnights” rather than points being docked or one of them storming away. Rose was slightly dismayed to realize that maybe this was a First Conversation that would warrant capitalization and the analysis that came with it.

As Rose lay back in bed, however, she reflected on Charlotte’s theory. Passion? Would that help Rose better understand the fascination that her peers held for mouths and tongues and snogging? 

Maybe she did feel something like passion when debating with Scorpius, their heated argument far more intense than anything she had shared with Logan, yet it had managed to remain civil in its conclusion.

That didn’t mean she suddenly felt a desire to throw herself at him, though. Charlotte wasn’t right about _everything._

* * *

Rose had little time to confront her adolescent angst (if that’s what it was-- she wasn’t too sure) as O.W.L.s approached. James may have helped her study from time to time, but Rose took to spending all her free time in the library nonetheless. The younger students began referring to her preferred table as “Rose’s Table,” which counted as a win in her books.

Rose’s hair had become bushier in direct relation to her stress, and on that day, she had managed to wrestle it into a messy bun atop her head, but strands stuck up around her face. Her robes were fairly askew and her tie crooked, sure signs that she had been spending too much time in the library.

“So I noticed you and Malfoy haven’t been fighting as much lately,” Charlotte commented, blowing casually on her nails. Rose was creating a study guide for Transfiguration (the exam was just a month away!), but Charlotte took a more relaxed approach to study, which basically consisted of looking over Rose’s notes the night before an exam. As such, she took to completing her beauty rituals beside Rose while the latter studied, so as to best terrorize Rose. Well, that was Rose’s hypothesis, at least.

“Really?” Rose questioned absently, flipping through her notes from second year.

“Did you snog him yet?”

Rose looked up sharply. “Why would I do that?”

“Passion, Rose. You two are practically magnetic around each other.” Charlotte considered her nails carefully. “Does this colour look okay against my skin?”

“It looks wonderful. Charlotte, why don’t you understand that I don’t want to snog Malfoy?”

Charlotte looked perplexed at the prospect. “What does that even mean? I hardly know the guy and I want to snog him. Merlin, those lips...not to mention how mysterious he is.”

Rose thought back to the connection between them as they argued, and the flaws and doubts and fears she saw before her: his anxiety about his House, his distrust of his father, his lack of romantic experience. If anything, Malfoy seemed obvious to Rose. Then again, Charlotte had always been less perceptive, less appreciative of the nuances around her.

Rose couldn’t hold in a snort. “Mysterious? Malfoy? Are you sure we’re talking about the same person?”

“The way he _broods_...” Rose shook her head, turning back to her notes. Charlotte was looking into the distance, undoubtedly thinking something ridiculous about Malfoy. After a moment of trying and failing to focus back on her notes, Rose put her quill back down.

“Charlotte...” Rose paused. What was the best way to approach the topic? “When you look at a fit guy, what do you feel?”

Charlotte’s forehead crinkled in confusion, her gaze falling back onto Rose. “How d’you mean?”

“Just like...when you’re about to snog a bloke, what’re you thinking about?” Rose fiddled with her quill to avoid further eye contact.

“There’s not a lot of thinking involved at that point.” Rose looked up to find a smirk in place on Charlotte’s face. “I mean...mostly I’m just excited, especially if I know he’s a good snog.”

Rose frowned down at her notes. She picked up her quill again and tried to ignore Charlotte’s continued scrutiny by copying down some points on turning rabbits into slippers, although she couldn’t quite understand when that was going to be necessary information.

“Rose...it’s okay if you are, I’m just wondering...are you gay?”

Rose looked up so quickly her neck cracked audibly. She took a moment to wince before fixing Charlotte with a confused look. “What?”

Charlotte shrugged, turning her attention back to her nails. Today she was painting them a deep purple, the sheen reflecting the dim sunlight that filtered through the dust motes around them. Rose had never quite understood Charlotte’s need to constantly apply and re-apply nail varnish, but she supposed Charlotte had always cared more about her appearance than Rose did.

“It just seems like you never really check guys out, and you never seemed that into snogging Logan. I dunno. It just seemed like it could fit.”

Rose’s neck was heating up rapidly. _Abort! Abort conversation!_ her mind screamed at her.

“I don’t think I am,” Rose finally answered, scratching the back of her head awkwardly. “I mean...I don’t really find girls attractive or anything.” She coughed lightly and Charlotte bobbled her head in lame agreement. “Um...anyway, aren’t you supposed to be working on your Transfig homework?”

“Reckon my nails are dried enough now, yeah,” Charlotte agreed. Rose turned back to her work, ignoring the scratching of Charlotte’s quill to try to focus back on her notes.

Her mind was going at a million miles an hour, and nothing about it was related to bunnies and the incantation to turn them into household footwear.

* * *

“Weasley!”

Rose had been contentedly strolling down the corridor, ready to drop all of her school stuff off in the Common Room before heading out to join all her friends by the Black Lake. She was free, so wonderfully done with all her OWLs and had nothing to do but wait for her results. There was no need to go to the Library and look over her Charms notes, or reread the chapter of her Potions book in case it something unexpected came up on a pop quiz.

Tomorrow, no doubt, the anxiety and concern would set in, as she started second guessing question 36A on the written History of Magic exam, or her potting techniques on the Herbology practical. She would begin searching the skies every morning for the tell-tale owl that foretold her future, rethinking her studying techniques, calculating what she would need in which subjects to move on–

But those were tomorrow’s worries.

Today, she could join the rest of her friends, lounging outside, sending flirtatious looks to boys and enthusing over the upcoming holidays. Rose’s robes were slung over her bag, her skirt allowing her legs to breathe in the June heat. Her hair was braided to the side, although the braid was falling apart from her fidgeting with it during her exams and threatened to fall apart all together at the slight provocation. 

It seemed that Malfoy had other concerns that afternoon, though, Rose thought, turning to face the Ravenclaw with a sigh. “Yes, Malfoy?”

He caught up with her in a few quick strides, giving her little time to look him over. He had also discarded his robes somewhere, exposing his rolled-up button-down and trousers. His light hair was slicked against his head in some places with sweat, but he seemed unbothered about it. Despite his slightly disheveled appearance, he looked wholly determined.

Rose opened her mouth to question his urgency, but before she got the chance, Malfoy placed his hands on either side of her face and looked intently in her eyes. Up close, Rose could see blue flecks mixed into the grey, a freckle just beside his nose, the faintest signs of blonde stubble around his jaw–

His lips crashed onto hers before she understood what was happening and Rose thought she may finally understand what Charlotte had been saying about passion. It seemed like he was trying to communicate _something_ as his mouth moved against hers, his hand finding the back of her hair and the other slipping down from her cheek to her neck, sending shivers down her spine.

Rose realized belatedly that her eyelids had failed to flutter shut at the initial contact and she was instead staring at his face, which was really _quite_ close to her own because _his mouth was touching hers and his hand was in her hair and he was_ snogging _her._

After a long moment, during which Rose’s confusion continued to grow and she forced her eyes to close and she brought her own hand up to his hair, which was unexpectedly soft, _what kind of conditioner did he even use to get it like that_ – the pressure disappeared from her mouth and she was left feeling strangely alone.

Her eyes blinked open to find Malfoy–she wondered idly whether she was obligated to call him Scorpius now– smirking at her as he backed away, his hands tucked into his pockets casually. His hair still looked wild, now with tufts sticking up in the back, and she marvelled that she had somehow done that.

“Have a nice summer, Rose.”

She watched him walk away, his confident saunter, the muscles in his back as he raised an arm to fix his hair. _Maybe_ she was beginning to understand what Charlotte meant about him being attractive.

But as she stood alone in the sunny corridor, one hand tracing her lips absently, mind turning over the unexpected actions of Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy, she was forced to acknowledge that she still didn’t understand all the excitement around snogging.

Raking a hand through her disintegrating braid, Rose continued down to the dungeons, her mind at war with itself. Why didn’t she seem to want to snog guys? _Was_ she gay? And what conditioner _did_ Scorpius use?

It was only when she reached the wall that led to her Common Room that Rose stopped and realized she was probably ignoring the most important question of all.

_Why had Scorpius Malfoy just kissed her?_

* * *

It wasn’t a conscious decision not to tell Charlotte what had happened between her and Scorpius Malfoy after the OWLs. 

For whatever reason, though, when Rose joined her friends out on the grounds, she mentioned nothing of their encounter. And then that night, at their annual end-of-the-year girls’ night, she said nothing about it, letting Charlotte natter on instead about An Zhou and how hot he would become over the summer. The next day, when Rose returned from her Prefects meeting and found Charlotte alone in the compartment, the words still didn’t come.

That didn’t mean Rose wasn’t incredibly confused and rethinking every interaction she had ever had with Scorpius Malfoy, though.

(She found herself calling him by his full name, thinking it maybe an acceptable compromise on the whole Name Issue. She was also of the opinion that it added slight gravitas to her thoughts about him, but wasn’t sure if she wanted to give him that power.)

(Not that she thought about him.)

(Much.)

If there was one good thing that Scorpius Malfoy had done, it was to distract Rose from her impending OWL results.

“Rosie, you’ve seemed awfully distracted the past few weeks,” her mum commented one morning as Rose munched on some toast and stared out the window.

Rose started at her words, unaware that anybody else had joined her in the kitchen. She found her mum sipping on some coffee across the table, the Prophet spread in front of her. Her mum was wearing blue robes, her hair tamed into an intricate bun atop her head. Rose was still clad in the shirt and shorts she had worn to bed, the braid she had slept in unravelling on her shoulder.

Rose shrugged, turning back to the window. “Just worried about the OWLs. You know how it is.”

Her mum nodded sympathetically, a wistful expression crossing her face. Rose exhaled in relief that her cover story had been accepted, still unsure why she even needed a cover story in the first place.

“Harry and Ron didn’t care in the least about receiving our results,” her mum sighed. “Harry was still upset about Sirius, of course. But I think Ron forgot he would even get the results over the summer.”

Rose nodded absently, tuning out her mother’s adolescent memories and wondering instead what Scorpius Malfoy was doing that summer. Was he thinking about her as much as she was thinking about him? _What_ was he thinking about her? 

After all, she still wasn’t sure what _she_ thought of _him._

He infuriated her, and irritated her more than anybody else she knew. He knew the best ways to get under her skin and start an argument. He was arrogant, and condescending, and dismissive of people he thought beneath him.

But then she had gotten glimpses of a different side of him, few and far between though they were. She had seen him to be passionate about his opinions, and curious in classes, and light-hearted when talking to his friends. 

She’d once told Logan that they didn’t bring out the best in each other. She was beginning to wonder if they didn’t bring out the worst.

After all, when she thought back to their many arguments over the years, she could see herself through his eyes. Arrogant, like she owned the school the minute she arrived because she already knew so much about Hogwarts and had so much family there. Dismissive, because of what she had already heard from her father and the history books. Condescending, because she assumed she would be the best in anything she tried.

Desperate to get out of her parents’ shadows.

Maybe she just saw what she wanted to in him. And maybe she was really seeing a reflection of her own worst traits, habits and assumptions she’d grown out of second year. 

Maybe she had never really given Scorpius Malfoy a chance.

* * *

“Heya Rosie!”

Rose was startled out of her thoughts at the sound of her name and turned around to find James walking towards her. She had been wandering through the garden behind the Burrow, avoiding the chaos of all her cousins in the kitchen.

It was the day after the monthly family get-together, when all the Weasleys and spouses and children arrived at the Burrow for dinner and mayhem. As the children grew, they started having sleepovers after, relieving their parents for the night. The morning after was always hectic and overwhelming, and Rose wasn’t really feeling up to it.

Instead, she was inspecting the flowers Nana Molly cared for so fastidiously. The colors soothed her, mixes of blue and purple and green, and the floral fragrance grounded her firmly in her childhood hideout.

She was wearing some simple robes, a light fabric that allowed her to stroll in the August sun without overheating. Her hair was tied into a messy bun, away from her face without too much fuss. 

“Hey James.”

James caught up to her with an easy grin, tucking his hands into the pockets of his robes after running a hand backwards through his wild hair. It had little effect on the chaos, but he didn’t seem to care.

“I haven’t seen you around much this summer.”

Rose shrugged, turning back towards the flowers and observing a stray gnome that was trying to hide behind a nearby bush. 

“Al’s been busy with Isabelle, you’ve been busy with Anna. Didn’t see much of a point in visiting.”

James’s lips quirked down into a frown. “Aw, we’d’ve loved to have you.” Rose shot him a small smile and they stood in a content silence for a long moment as Rose studied James.

Rose had never tried to consciously work out her cousin, the little details that contributed to his whole. He had always been an obvious part of her life, with his black strands of hair sticking up haphazardly around his long, narrow face, his eyes a dark mix of brown and green and his mouth...a mouth like any other. She had known this face as long as she had known her own, and could look into his eyes and see not just her reflection as a sixteen year old, but also a nine year old and six year old and before she even knew what age was.

Sometimes family overwhelmed her, the idea that these people had known her at every stage of her development and remember every little thing she had ever done wrong.

James cleared his throat. Rose could see his eyebrows turn down, his nose scrunch up slightly in discomfort, as his hand rose unconsciously to scratch the back of his head.

“Listen, Rosie. I may or may not have seen something in a certain hallway on the last day of exams between yourself and a Ravenclaw who shall not be named.”

Rose could feel her ears heating up as her gaze snapped back to the flowers in front of her. Of course somebody had seen it. Of course it couldn’t be some freak moment that nobody ever addressed again.

“I didn’t tell anybody, don’t worry,” James continued after a moment. “And I’m not going to. You know Scorp and I are friends. But...if you want to talk about anything, anytime, I’m here for you, okay? You’ve seemed a bit preoccupied this summer.”

Rose frowned down at the variegated tulip in front of her, grown larger and more colorful from her grandmother’s ministrations and Charms. 

Could James possibly know about her weird snogging issue? 

No, she realized after another moment of thought, James just knew that she and Scorpius Malfoy had a strange relationship. Anybody would be confused when somebody with that connection snogged them.

“It’s just so _confusing,”_ Rose finally admitted, looking up at James, and voicing more than one concern in that simple statement. It was the first time she had confirmed out loud that yes, that really had happened, that is wasn’t some strange dream, and that it really had affected her quite a bit. “I don’t know what any of it really means.”

James nodded sympathetically. “Well...I don’t want to betray Scorp’s confidence. But I will say a few things. He was relieved when you and Logan broke it off. He was excited when you called the truce. And he was ecstatic when I ran into him the last day of exams.”

Rose’s frown deepened at James’s comments. “D’you think he fancies me?”

James smiled mysteriously. “That, my young cousin, is something you should ask him about, not me. But, if you do that, make sure you know what you want beforehand.”

Rose cocked her head at James curiously. “When did you get so wise and enigmatic?”

James raised his eyebrows at her with a crooked grin and shrugged. “Dunno. Anyway, I think the parental units will be coming to pick us up any minute, so we should get back inside. Unless you’re actually planning to run away right now, in which case I will have to stop you.”

Shaking her head and chuckling, Rose followed James back towards the crooked house. 

Scorpius Malfoy couldn’t just _fancy_ Rose, could he? There’s _no way_ it was that simple.

* * *

“So, Rose, how was your summer?” Raj asked her as they walked down the narrow train corridor towards the prefects carriage. They had both changed into their robes once the train set off and bumped into each other on the way to the annual meeting that kicked off the year. 

Rose had carefully rebraided her hair after changing so that it hung in a neat plait on her shoulder. Her badge was shining brightly beside it and her tie perfectly straight. She may never reach Charlotte-levels of attention to wardrobe, but Rose had decided to try to stay a little more collected this year.

It had nothing to do with a certain pale Ravenclaw, nothing at all.

Rose shrugged noncommittally. “Not bad. Didn’t get up to anything exciting except a family trip to France. How ‘bout you?”

“Went to stay with my uncle in Manchester for a while, which was nice.” Raj continued explaining something about music and the city and some band he loved, but Rose was rather distracted as they entered the compartment and she located the grey gaze she’d been wondering about since June.

After a moment of prolonged eye contact, Scorpius Malfoy mouth twitched up into a confident smirk and he winked at her before turning back to the other Ravenclaw Prefect in their year. Rose was rooted to the spot.

Had he really just _winked_ at her? _Who even winked anymore?_ Was that a _thing?_

“Something wrong, Rose?”

Raj’s words finally jolted her out of her thoughts and, shaking her head in reassurance, Rose took a seat beside her partner. She listened vaguely as he started talking about a day trip to Liverpool he had taken, and something else about some other band he loved, but it all felt like this was happening to somebody else, and Rose was merely watching from above.

The meeting dragged on, Rose hardly paying attention as the new Heads explained everything she already knew from her Prefect duties the previous year. She tapped her fingers anxiously against the plush cushion of the train car, waiting impatiently for when her chance would present itself.

Finally, a million years later, the Prefects began filing out of the compartment and Rose gazed intently at the back of a pale blonde head in front of her. After making quick excuses to an indifferent Raj, Rose managed to weave through the crowd of Prefects to grab her target by the back of his robes.

“What the hell!” he exclaimed as she dragged him along the corridor, looking into the compartments she passed for an empty one. He twisted in her grip, but stumbled along behind her nonetheless, muttering to himself along the way. Finding a room to her liking, she fumbled to open the doors before pushing him into it.

He straightened up indignantly, brushing over his robes and straightening his tie before looking up at her. Rose closed the doors gently before rounding on him and crossing her arms.

“Why hello, Weasley, nice to see you too,” he said with a sarcastic grin. “I’ve had a marvellous summer, thanks for asking!”

“What’re you playing at, Malfoy?”

He stilled for a moment, cocking his head at her and narrowing his eyes in thought. She could see that his nose was red, probably sunburned, and he had grown over the summer so that he looked stretched out and lanky. 

Eventually he shrugged with a smirk. “What do you think, Weasley?”

Rose took a measured step towards him, stopping just closer to him than societal norms generally dictated. She could see his Adam’s apple bob as she looked deliberately up at him through her eyelashes, remembering Charlotte’s advice from so long ago. She tilted her head experimentally, watching as his gaze tracked the movement and flickered down to her lips.

Rose could have groaned in frustration, if that weren’t totally out of place for the moment they were sharing. She just didn’t get why he seemed affected by her proximity to him, just like how Logan had sometimes trailed off in the library when she bit her lip or chewed on the end of her quill. _What was it that she was missing?_

This close to him, she could see into his eyes with startling clarity, his pointed chin and the light stubble there, the slope of his nose caught in the sunlight streaming in from the window opposite them– but she felt nothing but the same anxiety that filled her when she would have to take a difficult test, her palms glistening with perspiration and her heart rate accelerating suddenly.

No real progress on the Snogging Front, then.

Rose took a step back and was strangely glad to see his lips twitch down into a quick frown and his chest rising and falling quickly with the anticipation of– what? A good snog?

“Let’s talk, Scorpius.”

Rose sat on one of the empty benches, crossing her legs primly and resting her clasped hands atop her knee. Scorpius slumped down across from her, legs sprawled casually, one hand raking back through his hair impatiently.

“What would you like to talk about, Rose?”

His tone matched hers: polite, professional, objective. The flash in his eyes and the fingers tapping against his thigh told her he was not nearly as composed as he pretended to be.

“Let’s start with why you decided to kiss me in June.”

Malfoy’s eyes darted towards the window, flickering rapidly to keep up with the English countryside flying by the window. He absently began cracking his knuckles, brow furrowed in thought. Rose tried not to look too curious or impatient as she waited for his response.

“The thing about you, Rose, is that you’re rather insufferable, aren’t you?”

Rose frowned. That did not seem like a promising beginning. What if James had been wrong?

“I mean, right off the bat, you acted like you knew everything and everyone at Hogwarts, and that just because your father had told you some things about the War, you had the right to judge others.”

Rose thought back to her first year at Hogwarts, when she had been haughty and judgmental, looking down on Malfoy because her father told her to. She had been impressionable, a daddy’s girl, and desperate to redeem herself after the worst possible Sorting.

“But then, after a while, I realised that we had more in common than we had to separate us, didn’t we? We were both dedicated students, and curious enough that we crossed paths in the library pretty frequently. We both wanted nothing more than to escape our parents’ legacies and make a name for ourselves independently. We were both more observant than could do us any good, so we always had more than enough to argue about.”

Rose’s frown deepened as she reflected back to their petty arguments over the years, the cutting insults founded on careful observation coupled with intentional misunderstanding of the other’s actions.

“But then you did the most surprising thing. You called a truce and stopped arguing. And I started wondering if maybe you had realized we had so much potential that we were wasting with our pointless rows. But then you didn’t really do much else, so I thought _I_ needed to do something surprising to make you realize what we could be.”

Rose gaped at the blonde Ravenclaw for a long moment as he lounged comfortably, his gaze fixed back out the window. His eyes snapped to hers when she finally responded.

“Why didn’t you try to stop the rowing earlier?”

He lifted one shoulder in a lopsided shrug. “I didn’t think you would listen to me. You can be quite stubborn, you know. And I liked our arguments. It was better than nothing.”

Rose lifted a hand to her mouth, chewing the nail on her middle finger absently and staring at him shamelessly. 

“So...you weren’t messing me around when you snogged me? You actually fancy me?”

Scorpius let out a disbelieving snort and nodded. “Of course I wasn’t messing you around. D’you really think I would do that?”

Rose twisted her hands and shrugged halfheartedly. “We just...haven’t really been civil that long, you know?”

Malfoy sighed and rubbed a hand against the back of his neck. “I mean, yeah. But I already feel like I know a lot about you, y’know? And I guess I thought it was reciprocal.”

Rose paused and thought back to that thread she felt between them when they argued, that connection that allowed her to see his insecurities and understand him, at times, better than Charlotte or Al.

“So, I don’t want to put any pressure on you or anything, but you’re really not responding enthusiastically to this conversation, which is rather disheartening, and I’m starting to feel like I might have accidentally taken advantage of you in June, so I’m really sorry because that’s not what I meant to do–”

Rose rolled her eyes but a small smile played across her lips.

“Shut up, you idiot. I’m just processing everything. If I had wanted you to stop, you’d’ve known it.”

“I’m sure that’s true, and just snogging you out of the blue seemed like a good idea at the time, but since then I’ve realized that maybe it wasn’t respectful of your wishes–”

“We should probably have a discussion about consent at some point, I agree, but now is _not the time,_ Scorpius.”

Malfoy ruffled his hair, his eyes flashing with anxiety as Rose continued to think over the situation. She may not have completely followed James’s advice in that she hadn’t really figured out much of anything, but her curiosity and his winking made it just about impossible to avoid their current confrontation.

“So...how ‘bout those Cannons?”

“Shut up, Scorpius.”

“Can you just say something? I’ve really said a lot about my feelings and stuff to you, which isn’t something I enjoy doing, and you’re just sitting there with your forehead all crinkley and–”

Rose sighed and rubbed a hand against her forehead. 

“In an ideal world, what would happen when we left this compartment?”

Scorpius pursed his lips, his brow crumpling in thought. “Um...how d’you mean?”

Rose uncrossed her legs and leaned forwards, bridging the tips of her fingers together. “What’s your endgame here?”

Scorpius sighed and leaned his head back against the wall. “I guess, ideally, we’d agree to try out dating.”

“Dating,” Rose repeated flatly.

“You know...walks around the lake...sitting together at meals...going to Hogsmeade together...aren’t you the one who had a ten-month relationship?”

Exasperation crept into Malfoy’s voice, but Rose ignored it, staring down at her hands and turning his words over in her mind. She hadn’t been sure where she stood before this conversation, but now that the question presented itself, she understood what she should do.

“Let’s try it.”

He lifted his head off the wall and raised his eyebrows at her, his eyes widening hopefully. 

“Really?”

Rose shrugged with a smirk.

“What’s the worst case? We go back to arguing all the time. There’s not much to lose.”

Malf–she would have to call him Scorpius, she supposed– Scorpius let a wide grin stretch across his face as he stood.

“Brilliant!”

Rose nodded as she too stood. They stared at each other for a moment, brown and grey searching each other. They were stood close once again, and Rose could see his chest rising and falling rapidly.

“Well, I’d best go find Charlotte, and I reckon you’d want to find your mates, then.”

Uncertainty danced in Scorpius’s eyes as Rose backed away towards the door.

“I’ll...see you around.”

Rose thought it was rather satisfying to be the one leaving him to watch her walk away.

* * *

Rose quickly discovered that dating Scorpius Malfoy was very different than dating Logan Crawford.

Her first exposure to the difference was the reaction of her friends, her relatives, and, most obviously, the general population of Hogwarts. Rose was happy to have flown relatively under the radar for most of her Hogwarts career, fulfilling the expectations of many as she kept her head down, studied, and avoided the trouble others sought out.

That relative anonymity (and she knew it was relative because she was still the daughter of Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, even if many people tried to pretend it was no big deal) ended the first day of term when word spread about her relationship.

Her friends had been surprised and excited, chattering away about it quickly and loudly and leaving Rose little room to explain what had actually happened. Charlotte had sent her several smug glances and took the first opportunity to make sure Rose remembered that she had called that.

“You just thought we should snog,” Rose had pointed out.

“Isn’t that what you’re doing?” Charlotte asked, confused.

Rose wasn’t really sure about Charlotte’s conceptualization of a relationship. 

Rose’s family was louder about their reactions to the situation.

James had simply beamed at her, congratulated her, and then promised that he would keep Fred from doing anything to mess with Scorpius. Lucy had asked if it meant that Rose was over Logan so she could go out with him. Hugo and Lily asked when they could meet him, which Rose was trying to hold off as long as possible. (After all, they had yet to go on an actual date, and Rose’s family was insane, so it was best to let Scorpius stay out of everything as long as possible.)

Rose didn’t mind her family nearly as much as she disliked the interest of the general Hogwarts population.

The first day of term, whispers followed Rose in the corridors wherever she went, multiplying and amplifying when she and Scorpius talked politely outside of Charms.

She didn’t really understand what the big deal was– that was a lie. Of _course_ it was a big deal when the daughter of two members of the Golden Trio started dating the son of a Death Eater. That didn’t mean she had to like it, though, especially when everything was so _new_ and _confusing_ and _ambiguous._

“So...Malfoy.” Al dropped into the seat beside her in the library where Rose had been working on some light reading. It was only the first week of classes, after all, and without the threat of impending exams on her shoulders, Rose thought she could take the chance to read about what interested _her_ for once.

“Yep.” Rose closed the book and turned to her cousin. His hair was slightly unruly, but nowhere near how bad it had been when they were younger, and his robes looked extremely wrinkled, as per usual.

“How’d that happen, then?” Al’s bright green eyes seemed curious rather than judgmental, but Rose wasn’t sure how much she trusted her judgment of these things anymore.

Rose lifted her shoulders in a casual shrug. “Not too sure of that myself. We’re just testing things out to see where they’re going.”

“Have you two been like secretly snogging for ages?”

Rose sighed and scratched at her forehead. “Why do so many people think that has to be the case?”

“That wasn’t a no,” Al pointed out with a smirk.

“No!” Rose could feel heat spreading across her neck. “Merlin, I don’t even like snogging that much.”

Rose froze. She hadn’t meant to say that, not to her cousin. He may be one of her closest and oldest friends, but that didn’t mean that she liked to talk about _everything_ with him. 

“Was Logan that bad a snog?” Rose could see color rising on Al’s neck.

“That’s not what I meant,” Rose sighed, deciding to go for broke. “I just...don’t really feel a need to snog _anybody._ Like ever. Even when I was dating Logan.” 

Confusion crumpled Al’s brow as he scratched at his neck awkwardly.

“Um...sorry? I have no idea what you mean, though. I mean, I love snogging Bella. Um...I guess you’ve never been that touchy-feely so maybe it makes sense.”

Rose couldn’t help but feel disappointed, even if she didn’t know what she had expected from her slip up. She let out a long breath.

“It’s no big deal. I don’t eve–”

“Rose! Just the ex-girlfriend I was hoping to see.” Logan’s cheerful greeting cut Rose off as he slid into a seat across from the cousins.

“Hey Logan!” she grinned brightly, immensely relieved at having an out from her conversation with Al. Logan and Al exchanged some peculiar bro handshake slap that confused Rose immensely.

“Now, former love of my life, what is this I hear about you and one of my dear Housemates?” Logan’s familiar gaze landed on Rose, a slight upturn to his mouth indicating amusement.

“We’re trying things out.” Rose shrugged again, wishing she had a better response. What was she doing with Scorpius?

“I knew there was more than hatred between you two!” Logan crowed quietly. Rose suspected that respect for the Library was probably instilled in Ravenclaw DNA. “I knew it. I’m so happy for you two!”

“Thanks, Logan.”

Al looked between the pair. “You two are bloody weird. How are you so normal after a breakup?”

Rose patted Al on the head with a smirk. “Because we are wise and mature and capable of moving on in life. Now, boys, I do believe I have a date at the lake.”

Logan clutched his heart dramatically. “My dearest Rose! I thought that was our place. How dare you bring your new man to our spot?”

Rose giggled, rolling her eyes. “My deepest apologies, Mr. Crawford. Unfortunately, the castle is too small for each of my new beaus to have their own place. And the lake does complement my hair ever so well.”

With a wave, Rose left her cousin and ex-boyfriend to meet Scorpius for their first official date.

* * *

Rose took a deep breath, ran one hand down her carefully plaited hair, and pushed the doors to the castle open. The sun momentarily blinded her, but after blinking rapidly for a moment, she was able to take in the grounds better. 

It was relatively warm for Scotland in September, and a number of students were scattered across the grounds, enjoying the weather and their friends. Rose strode with purpose, as she always did, towards the tree where she and Scorpius had agreed to meet, pleased to see him already there, sun reflecting off of his blindingly bright hair.

“You’re early,” she commented once she was a few feet behind him. Startled, he nearly tripped over his robes as he turned to face her. His blonde hair seemed even more meticulously combed than usual, his robes showing signs of more attention than normal. Clearly she was not the only one who had been nervous for this date.

“I figured the wrath of Rose Weasley was not something I wanted to face,” he replied, his tone shooting for casual, but his uncertain eyes betraying his anxiety. “You look nice.”

Rose glanced skeptically down at the same uniform she had worn for five years.

“I mean, well...you always look nice.”

Scorpius coughed, looking down as he scuffled his feet on the ground. Rose thought she had seen every mood that he had to offer, but this nervous side was new to her. She smiled fondly up at him.

“Thanks,” she replied. They were still stood a few feet apart from each other, and she took a cautious step forwards. She could feel the eyes of some students behind them, no doubt anxious to get the scoop on the pair of them. “Would you like to go for a walk?”

He nodded, and the pair turned away from the school. Rose was distracted by the calming waves of the lake beyond Scorpius, the gentle crashing up against the rocks across the lake. She refocused on the boy beside her and found him watching her with a soft smile.

“So, how’s your first week of school going?” she finally asked.

The conversation flowed easily, jumping from topic to topic. Rose learned more about the enigmatic Ravenclaw, uncovering the details behind the boy she had known so long. They still argued, of course, because that seemed to be their primary form of communication, but it was no longer as heated or biting, and they ended them with smiles rather than curses.

At some point, their hands slipped into each other, and Rose was struck by how right it felt. The warm pressure against her palm was something different than she’d felt with Logan, no matter how much she had rationalized her feelings then.

Then again, maybe she was just rationalizing them again now.

They had ambled around the grounds, never straying too far from the lake, and eventually they came to a stop outside the doors to the castle. It was nearly dinnertime, and Rose knew that Dennis and Charlotte would be curious to hear about her afternoon.

When Rose looked up into Scorpius’s face, she found him searching her own. His grey eyes were soft yet penetrating, curious yet kind. She wondered if she would ever stop finding new things about him, new information to add to her mental filing cabinet.

“So, I know last time I may have jumped the sparks,” Scorpius said, tone hesitant, “but would it be okay if I kissed you now?”

Smiling, Rose leaned up, wrapping her arms around his neck. Their mouths met in the middle, nowhere near the intensity of last June, but sweeter, searching.

It took a moment for Rose to realize that she had once again failed to close her eyes, that she was instead staring right at Scorpius’s fluttering eyelashes, numbly aware of the squishy pressure against her mouth.

Shit.

* * *

Rose had put on a happy face when talking to Charlotte and Dennis and Al, had gushed over her newfound feelings for Scorpius, and rattled on about how much she liked him. She wasn’t lying, not at all, and she couldn’t suppress the smile that bubbled up whenever she made eye contact with him across the Great Hall. But she wasn’t telling the full truth, either.

While she was listening to them all tease her about her stubbornness, how she abused him for years before giving him a chance, how none of them were surprised, she was holding back tears that threatened to turn her into a blubbering mess.

She’d never been such a drama queen before, and she wasn’t going to start being one now– or that’s what she told herself, ignoring the crushing anxiety and keeping the conversation going.

It was too much for one girl to handle, really, but Rose was nothing if not independent and headstrong to a fault. And, as she kept telling herself, it was really not a big deal at all.

Sure, she didn’t like kissing people, and didn’t understand anything about it. And sure, she felt vaguely disgusted at the idea of doing anything beyond kissing, while she was sure that Charlotte thought about little else. But people had different priorities in life, and maybe she was just a late bloomer, or something. Maybe she actually was gay!

Rose took a moment to stare across the table at Charlotte, who was listening to Dennis prattle on about some Quidditch match he had listened to the night before. Charlotte was obviously a very pretty young woman, something few people in their year had failed to pick up on. She was all long, dirty blonde hair, and carefully made-up blue eyes, with clear, delicate skin and obsessively glossed lips.

Rose tried to picture kissing Charlotte, tried to imagine the feeling of those shiny lips against her own, but something about it just felt weird, forced, fake.

Rose joined back into the conversation, trying not to let her pointless and irrelevant crisis interfere with her friends, trying not to draw attention to her inner turmoil. She wished that she could just grow up already and get with the program, but unfortunately it seemed like that wasn’t going to help much.

After dinner, Rose was determined to go back to the dungeons, feign illness, and have a good, cathartic cry about it all. Hopefully that would get...whatever this is out of her mind and she’d be free to feel the excitement her new relationship was supposed to engender within her.

“Rose! Wait up!”

Unfortunately, it seemed like Scorpius wasn’t going to let that happen. She sighed, twisting her braid around her hand and mentally bracing herself for the ensuing conversation. She fixed a smile on her face and turned around.

“Hey, Scorp. What’s up?”

His face lit up at her nickname and he smiled blankly down at her for a minute before realizing that he was expected to answer the question.

“Um, there’s something I wanted to talk to you about,” he replied, bringing a hand up to scratch at the back of his neck. “Do you think we could go outside? I won’t keep you long.”

Rose bit her lip, considering her options. On the one hand, Scorpius’s whole body was sending off uncomfortable vibes as he struggled not to fidget, but on the other, she was dangerously close to breaking down _for no goddamn reason._

“Sure!” she replied with false cheer, turning towards the doors outside and cutting through the post-dinner crowds. She took a moment to smooth down her robes and straighten her tie as Scorpius trailed behind her.

“So what was it you were hoping to talk about?” she asked as they walked down the steps, Scorpius’s hands wedged firmly in his trouser pockets. He was staring hard at the ground, evidently thinking deeply about whatever was concerning him. Rose started to wonder if she should be worried.

“I know that we said we just wanted to date and we don’t want to weigh ourselves down with expectations, so I’m sorry to be this direct,” Scorpius began, his lips twitching down into a hard line. Rose frowned, wondering what on earth he was on about.

“But I’ve gotten to know you pretty well, over the years of constant arguing and such. And...well, I can tell when something is bothering you, you know? Your forehead gets extra crinkley and your eyes look troubled and the edges of your mouth turn slightly down.”

Rose smiled softly at his descriptions, knowing that she could list off similar indicators of Scorpius’s own mood.

“And I’ve never been in a relationship before, as you know, so I’m basing this mostly off of gossip and literature, but I get the feeling that starting a relationship off with honesty is the most important thing. So, with all that said, I couldn’t help but notice the telltale signs of Rose Weasley distress when we kissed earlier, and I wanted to see if there’s anything you want to talk about.”

They had come to a stop by the edge of the lake, which was reflecting the last rays of sunlight into the increasingly dark sky. The first few stars were already twinkling merrily away, unaware of the distress of one sixteen year old miles and miles away.

Rose sighed quietly, letting a hand run over her braid, trying to center her thoughts. Given everything she knew about Scorpius, how much she could constantly read from the smallest of his expressions, she should have expected that reciprocity to come back to bite her in the ass.

Letting out another deep breath, Rose couldn’t stop the tears that began to seep out of her eyes. She closed them, brought a hand up to hastily wipe the tears away, but Scorpius had of course already noticed.

“Oh shit, Rose, I’m so sorry!” he hastily apologized, reaching out instinctively and wrapping his arms around her. She leaned into him, revelling in the simple touch, and rested her nose against his robes, ignoring the snot that she was no doubt spreading everywhere. Silent drops continued to stream down her cheeks. “I didn’t mean to make you cry! Shit shit shit this isn’t how–”

“Scorpius, shut up,” she said roughly into his shoulder, and he immediately fell quiet. Rose inhaled, trying to cling to the indescribable scent she associated so strongly with him, and collected her thoughts. Finally, she took a step back.

“I’m really sorry,” she said, wiping away the last of her tears. “Like, overwhelmingly sorry. I really can’t apologize enough. I’m just not built to hold this much pointless angst, you know?”

Scorpius’s forehead crinkled in confusion, his light eyebrows drawn together. “I’m not sure I really do.”

Rose let out a watery laugh. “Fair enough. Look, Scorp, it’s not about you. I really, really like you. That’s the problem.”

Scorpius squinted at her, confusion still written across his features.

“Wow, this really isn’t coming out how I meant it to be,” Rose muttered, running a hand along her braid. “Where to begin...so you know how I dated Logan for ten months?” Scorpius rolled his eyes as he nodded. Obviously he knew that. How could he not?

“It really started then, I guess. And this is going to sound so stupid, and that’s also part of the problem, because I really don’t know why I’m letting it overwhelm me so much–”

“Hey, I’m sure that’s not true,” Scorpius protested, his grey gaze locking with her own, his sympathy transparent. “I’m not going to judge you or anything, and how you’re feeling is really important.”

Rose’s lips twitched up in an involuntary smile. He was so sweet and supportive and _why didn’t she feel a need to snog him at all times?_

“Thanks,” she finally said, averting her gaze to her feet. “The thing is that I just hate snogging. Like, I hate every part of it, and I don’t understand it, and I never want to snog anybody, and even when it’s just a peck I don’t get the point of it! Charlotte makes it seem like the best thing in the world, and everybody else seems to be going crazy for it, but for me it just feels...unhygienic.”

She looked up and found Scorpius to be deep in thought, his steely gaze contemplative. Encouraged by the way he was accepting her words, she plowed on.

“I mean, Paris is willing to risk war for a shag with Helen, but that just seems idiotic and repulsive to me! At first, I thought it meant that there was something wrong with me, but then I wondered if it was about Logan. So I was hoping that with you, somebody who I feel strongly for and somebody with whom I have what Charlotte dubs “passion,” it would finally click.”

“But it didn’t,” Scorpius finished, nodding thoughtfully.

“So now you know that your girlfriend is a pointlessly emotional freak who gets bent out of shape over dumb stuff,” Rose sighed, crossing her arms defensively and looking back to the ground.

A soft hand cupped her chin, gently bringing her head back up so that she could see Scorpius’s fierce expression.

“While I knew that going into this relationship, I don’t qualify this conversation as something that substantiates that claim,” he informed her. He dropped his hand down to her shoulder, and brought her back into a hug. “This is as big a deal as it seems to you, and if it’s been bothering you this much, it’s a huge freaking deal.”

Rose closed her eyes, a huge grin overtaking her face. It felt amazing to finally have that confession off of her chest, and to have Scorpius take it all at face value was incredible. She wondered once more how she could have hated him so passionately for so much of their relationship.

“I’m sorry that I contributed to how you’re feeling,” he murmured into her hair.

“I’m sorry that I can’t appreciate your no doubt amazing snogging skills,” she whispered back.

They broke apart a while later, holding hands instead, and Rose felt a glow in her chest that she hadn’t felt for a while. Maybe Scorpius Malfoy was what she had been missing, after all.

* * *

When Rose exited Charms the next day, she was pleasantly surprised to find an excited Scorpius Malfoy at the door.

“Stalking me already, Malfoy?” she asked casually, concealing her grin.

“Wow, she’s got you whipped already,” Charlotte commented from beside Rose. With a small nod, she left the pair to go talk with Dennis and Al.

“That was not a good comment to make,” Rose said, frowning after her friend. “Men who respect their partners or contribute to the relationship outside of gender norms aren’t ‘whipped’–”

“Rose, as much as I’d love to listen to this rant sometime, I have something important to show you,” Scorpius interjected, his grin overwhelming the apparent urgency of his words. “C’mon.”

They wove through the corridor, hand in hand, as Rose discreetly checked that her bun wasn’t too all over the place. She had actually inspected herself in the mirror that morning in an effort to look presentable, per her new year’s resolution. New school year’s resolution, that is.

They came to a stop in a quiet alcove, set off from a mostly deserted hallway. Rose looked expectantly at Scorpius, who dove into his bag and rifled around for a moment before emerging victoriously with an impressively large book. He handed it to Rose, who read the leather-bound cover skeptically.

“ _A Beginner's Guide to Understanding Important Gender and Sexuality Terms?_ ” she read aloud, quirking an eyebrow. Scorpius nodded enthusiastically, thumbing through the book until he landed on a bookmarked page towards the beginning of the book.

“Asexuality?” she questioned. Scorpius gestured for her to read on, bouncing on the balls of his feet from excitement. The grin hadn’t dimmed since their conversation, such as it was, had begun.

 _Asexuality (or nonsexuality) is the lack of sexual attraction to anyone, or low or absent interest in sexual activity. It may be considered the lack of a sexual orientation, or one of the variations thereof, alongside heterosexuality, homosexuality and bisexuality..._ *

Rose’s eyes scanned the page quickly, a smile blossoming instantly. She read in silence, her own excitement growing, until she finished the quick introduction. She looked up at her boyfriend and saw her own happiness reflected back in his grey orbs.

“Scorpius, you’re a genius,” she told him, throwing her arms around his neck and grinning against his chest. “How’d you find this?”

“Well, I was thinking about what you’d told me while I was studying in the library this morning,” he told her, his voice muffled by her shoulder. “And I was like, she knows she’s not gay, but there’s probably more than that. So I hunted around the library, and found the section about homosexuality, and then I was flipping through this book and bam! here we are, hugging in a hallway.”

“You’re the best,” Rose told him softly, drawing back from the hug and looking seriously into his eyes. “Seriously, the best. I can’t tell you how I’m feeling right now– it’s liberating and relieving and amazing to know that I’m not just crazy, and that other people feel like this. Merlin, this is the best news ever!”

If she had felt like a weight was lifted when she had just _told_ Scorpius about it all, she now felt like there had barely been any weight to begin with. _Asexual._ It’s not that she needed to tell everybody she knew or anything, but it made the last few years seem all the more sensible. If there’s anything she looked for in life, after all, it was sensibility.

They smiled stupidly at each other for a long moment before Rose broke into a smirk.

“Don’t think this means that I’m not going to laugh at you for studying in the library on the second day of term, though.”

Scorpius shrugged carelessly. “I’m a Ravenclaw. I feel no shame about my library habits.”

Rose shook her head fondly.

“It’s rather ridiculous that I may not be the nerdier one in a relationship for once.”

“Well, I wouldn’t go _that_ far...”

Rose smiled up at him for another moment before frowning, suddenly realising something.

“Wait, but Scorpius,” she said slowly, dreading his reaction. “If I think I’m asexual, and you seem not to be, what does that mean for us? Do you not want to date me anymore?”

Scorpius shook his head quickly, his eyes wide. “Not at all, Rose. I mean...we’ll need to talk about some stuff, that’s for sure. But we have all the time in the world for that.”

“Well, not all the time,” Rose corrected, glancing down at her watch. “I do have the best class ever, aka Transfig, in fifteen minutes.”

“You are an idiot,” Scorpius replied, shaking his head in mock dismay.

“Maybe, but I’m _your_ idiot,” Rose informed him, grabbing his hand and smirking. He grinned down at her, grey eyes soft as they locked onto her gaze. 

“Now, what if we went back to Charlotte’s comment about you being whipped, because that’s going to be annoying me _all day..._ ”

As she walked through the corridor hand in hand with Scorpius Malfoy, Rose decided that maybe, despite everything, it would all work out okay.

**Author's Note:**

> Throughout this story, Rose refers to her crisis as something insignificant, inexplicable, annoying, etc. While I think it’s probably clear from the context, I do want to say that those views are unique to her, and that I find it very important! So if anybody is going through something similar, don’t pull a Rose! How you feel matters. :)
> 
> Additionally, Rose’s experiences are just one POV, based around my own. Asexuality is a big term that covers a lot of ground, and while I’ve had several people who identify as ace relate to this story, there are definitely some who would be like “what is this this isn’t how I feel.” So take it with a grain of salt! And I would encourage everybody to look around on the internet and learn more about asexuality if you’re not familiar with it! :) Thanks for reading! And if anybody wants to talk about asexuality/is looking for advice, my ask is always open at exysexual on tumblr. <3


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